could find them.”
“Heavens, Steve!” A look of alarm flashed over Nadia’s face, then disappeared
as rapidly as it had come into being. “But of course comets aren’t really dangerous.”
“Sure not. A comet’s tail, which so many people are afraid of as being poison
gas, is almost a perfect vacuum, even at its thickest, and we’d have to wear space-suits
anyway. And speaking of vacuum . . . whoopee! We don’t need mercury any more than
a goldfish needs a gas-mask. When we get Mr. Tube done, we’ll take him out into
space, leaving his mouth open, and very shortly he’ll be as empty as a bobby-soxer’s
skull. Then we’ll seal him up, flash him out, come back here, and start spilling our
troubles into Brandon’s shell-like ear!”
“Wonderful! You do get an idea occasionally, don’t you? But how do we get out
there? Where is this Can-Cell’s Comet?”
”I don’t know, exactly—there’s one rub. Another is that I haven’t even started the
transmitter and receptor units. But we’ve got some field-generators here On board that I
can use, so it won’t be so bad. And our comet is in this part of the Solar System
somewhere fairly close. Wish we had an Ephemeris, a couple of I-P solar charts, and a
real telescope.”
“You can’t do much without an Ephemeris, I shouldn’t think. It’s a good thing you
kept the chronometers going. You know the I-P time, day, and dates, anyway.”
“I’ll have to do without some things, that’s all,” and the man stared absently at the
steel wall. “I remember something about its orbit, since it is one thing that all I-P vessels
have to steer clear of. Think I can figure it close enough so that we’ll be able to find it in
our little telescope, or even on our plate, since we’ll be out of atmosphere. And it might
not be a bad idea for us to get away, anyway. I’m afraid of those folks on that space-
ship, whoever they were, and they must live around here somewhere. Cantrell’s Comet
swings about fifty million kilometers outside Jupiter’s orbit at aphelion—close enough for
us to reach, and yet probably too far for them to find us easily. By the time we get back
here, they probably will have quit looking for us, if they look at all. Then too, I expect
these savages to follow us up. What say, little ace—do we try it or do we stay here ?”
“You know best, Steve. As I said before, I’m with you from now on, in whatever
you think best to do. I know that you think it best to go out there. Therefore, so do I.”
“Well,” he said, finally, “I’d better get busy, then— there’s a lot to do before we
can start. The radio doesn’t come next, after all — the transmitter and receptor units
come ahead of it. They won’t mean wasted labor, in any event, since we’ll have to have
them in case the radio fails. You’d better lay in a lot of supplies while I’m working on that
stuff, but don’t go out of sight, and yell like fury if you see anything. We’d both better
wear full armor every time we go out-of-doors—unless I’m all out of control we aren’t
done with those savages yet. Even though they may be afraid of the demons of the
falls, I think they’ll have at least one more try at us.”
While Nadia brought in meat and vegetables and stored them away, Stevens
attacked the problem of constructing the pair of tight-beam, auto-dirigible transmitter
and receptor units which would connect his great turbo-alternator to the accumulators of
their craft, wherever it might be in space. From the force-field generators of the Forlorn
Hope he selected the two most suitable for his purpose, tuned them to the exact
frequency he required, and around them built a complex system of condensers and
coils.
Day after day passed. Their larder was full, the receptor was finished, and the
beam transmitter was almost ready to attach to the turbo-alternator before the calm was
broken.
“Steve!” Nadia shrieked. Glancing idly into the communicator plate, she had been
perfunctorily surveying the surrounding territory. “They’re coming! Thousands of them!
They’re all over the bench up there, and just simply pouring down the hills and up the
valley!”
“Wish they’d waited a few hours longer—we’d’ve been gone. However, we’re just
about ready for them,” he commented grimly, as he stared over her shoulder into the
communicator plate. “We’ll make a lot of those Indians wish that they had stayed at
home with their papooses.”
“Have you got all those rays and things fixed up ?”
“Not as many as I’d like to have. You see, I don’t know the composition of the I-P
ray, since it is outlawed to everybody except the police. Of course I could have found
out from Brandon, but never paid any attention to it. I’ve got some nice ultra-violet,
though, and a short-wave oscillatory that’ll cook an elephant to a cinder in about eight
seconds. We’ll keep ’em amused, no fooling! Glad we had time to cover our open sides,
and it looks as though that meteorite armor we put over the projectors may be mighty
useful, too.”
On and on the savages came, massed in formations showing some signs of rude
discipline. This time there was neither shrieking nor yelling; the weird creatures
advanced silently and methodically. Here and there were massed groups of hundreds,
dragging behind them engines which Stevens studied with interest.
“Hm . . . m . . . m. Catapults,” he mused. “You were right, girl of my dreams —
armor and bows and arrows wouldn’t help us much right now. They’re going to throw
rocks at us that’ll have both mass and momentum. With those things they can cave in
our side-armor, and might even dent our roof. When one of those projectiles hits, we
want to be where it ain’t, that’s all.”
Stevens cast off the heavily-insulated plug connecting the power plant leads to
his now almost fully charged accumulators, strapped himself and Nadia into place at the
controls, and waited, staring into the plate. Catapult after catapult was dragged to the lip
of the little canyon, until six of them bore upon the target. The huge stranded springs of
hair, fibre, and sinew were wound up to the limit, and enormous masses of rock were
toilsomely rolled upon the platforms. Each “gunner” seized his trip, and as the leader
shrieked his signal the six ponderous masses of metalliferous rock heaved into the air
as one. But they did not strike their objective, for as the signal was given, ‘Stevens shot
power into his projectors. The Forlorn Hope leaped out of the canyon and high into the
air over the open meadow, just as the six great projectiles crashed into the ground upon
the spot which, an instant before, she had occupied.
Rudimentary discipline forgotten, the horde rushed down into the canyon and the
valley, in full clamor of their barbaric urges. Horns and arms tossed fiercely, savage
noises rent the air, and arrows splintered harmlessly upon steel plate as the mystified
and maddened warriors upon the plain below gave vent to their outraged feelings.
“Look, Nadia! A whole gang of them are smelling around that power plug. Pretty
soon somebody’s going to touch a hot spot, and when he does we’ll cut loose on the
rest of them.”
The huge insulating plug, housing the ends of the three great cables leading to
the converters of the turbo-alternator, lay innocently upon the ground, its three yawning
holes invitingly open to savage arms. The chief, who had been inspecting the power-
plant, walked along the triplex lead and joined his followers at its terminus. Pointing with
his horns he jabbered orders, and three red monsters, one at each cable, bent to lift the
plug, while the leader himself thrust an arm into each of the three contact holes. There
was a flash of searing flame and the reeking smoke of burning flesh—those three arms
had taken the terrific no-load voltage of the three-phase converter system, and the full
power of the alternator had been shorted directly to ground through the comparatively
small resistance of his body.
Stevens had poised the Forlorn Hope edgewise in mid-air, so that the gleaming,
heavily armored parabolic reflectors of his projectors, mounted upon the leading edge of
the fortress, covered the scene below. As the charred corpse of the savage chieftain
dropped to the ground, it seemed to the six-limbed creatures that the demons of the
falls had indeed been annoyed beyond endurance by their intrusion; for, as if in
response to the flash of fire from the power plug, that structure so peculiarly and so
stolidly hanging in the air came plunging down toward them. From it there reached
down twin fans of death and destruction: one flaming an almost invisibly incandescent
violet which tore at the eyes and excruciatingly disintegrated brain and nervous tissues;